


A Good Memory Is Unpardonable

by daisysusan



Category: Lizzie Bennet Diaries
Genre: F/M, Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 16:24:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1096080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisysusan/pseuds/daisysusan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which family remains complicated, hard to define, and still kind of amazing. And weird. But mostly amazing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Good Memory Is Unpardonable

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fluffybun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluffybun/gifts).



> many thanks to m and c for looking this over! the title is a line from Pride & Prejudice because ... why not

They hold out for a long time, as long as they think is reasonable and then a bit longer. Lydia begs, and Gigi wheedles, and Mom pretty much openly threatens to go behind her back, but Lizzie manages to stand her ground about a Big Family Dinner. 

She and William take Lydia and Gigi and Mary out for dinner, because that seems unlikely to go catastrophically awry—and it doesn’t. It’s actually kind of nice, amazingly enough. A little nuts, with the way Lydia and Gigi seem to feed off each other’s energy, but it’s something. They pulled off an interaction between their families where no one is murdered and everyone seems to have a good time.

Except William, when Gigi starts gleefully telling Lydia embarrassing childhood stories, but Lizzie’s never been especially concerned about his dignity anyway. He clearly tries to be a good sport about it, which earns him an apology for having to be publicly embarrassed later.

And some other stuff, but the important part is the apology, not what they do after the apology.

\--

“It–” Jane starts to say, and then trails off.

“It would be a disaster,” Lizzie says, and Jane makes a face that might be an attempt at smiling.

“It might not?”

“Remember when Fitz said my impression of Catherine was uncanny?”

“Maybe they could … get along?” 

Lizzie just stares at her. Hopefully the webcam is good enough to convey her expression. 

“Fair point,” Jane says. “But if you and William are going to be together in any serious way, you can’t just keep your families apart. What if you get married?”

Lizzie splutters, both at the mention of marriage and at the implication that they might keep putting this off forever. Like William would let that happen. She tells Jane, in as many words, and Jane laughs. “He’ll hate it, but he won’t put it off forever. He’s too dutiful,” Lizzie adds. 

There’s a brief silence, and then Lizzie says, “At least Ricky Collins is in Winnipeg, Manitoba.” 

“You need to get it over with,” Jane says. If Lizzie didn’t love her, she would hate her for being so earnest. (And right.)

Lizzie groans—maybe a little melodramatically, but the emotion is genuine. 

“Fine,” she says. “I’ll talk to William about it.” 

Jane smiles beatifically.

Lizzie hangs up. And then immediately feels bad and calls back. But still, it’s the principle of the thing. 

\--

Lydia visits again a few weeks after Jane tries to harangue Lizzie into being a better daughter, and it’s still kind of weird how much Lizzie misses her. Even when she’s loud and overly energetic and screaming in Lizzie’s ear.

Maybe it’s because now she knows how weird it is when when Lydia _doesn’t_ do those things. 

Lizzie’s not used to seeing Lydia when she’s trying to win people over, though, and she’s genuinely making an effort with William. They’ll probably never be best friends, and watching them try to find common ground is almost hilariously awkward, but it—it means something. 

She doesn’t thank Lydia for it, because that would be condescending. But it’s nice.

\--

“What do you think would happen if my mom met your aunt?” Lizzie asks thoughtfully, though it takes her an embarrassing amount of time to work up the courage.

William coughs, and not in a politely surprised way. 

“Um,” he says, and then frowns. He’s starting to get the uncomfortable expression she thought was his default, which is honestly about how she feels about the whole thing.

“I mean,” she adds. “They might not kill each other? If we sat Dad and Lydia and Gigi and another dozen people between them.” 

“You underestimate Catherine,” William says. Lizzie laughs. 

“Probably.” She reaches for William’s hand. “But we can’t put it off forever.”

“We can try,” he says, and her heart clenches a little.

“That’s my line.” 

\--

It’s not an unmitigated disaster.

Yet, anyway.

Sure, Catherine asked Mom how she could possibly have sent her daughters out into the world so woefully unprepared for its trials, and Lydia made it all of eight seconds into Catherine’s first monologue before she started giving her steak knife appraising looks, but no blood has actually been spilled yet, and Dad seems to really like Gigi. 

Lizzie taps her foot against William’s leg under the table, and then catches his eye, hoping that her expression conveys “maybe this isn’t so bad after all.” He smiles back, a little strained but still heartfelt. 

And Catherine didn’t bring the dog, which is making everything go better. Though it might have a been a conversation piece. But Lydia would probably have insulted it. On the whole, for the best that it’s not here. 

Still, Lizzie tells Dad about the dog while there’s a rousing discussion of all the problems with young people distracting people at the end of the table. The look he gives her is worth every terrifying moment at this dinner. 

\--

“Never make me spend time with that woman again,” Lydia says in a panicked voice as soon as she’s out of earshot of Catherine. “I will move to New York and live with Jane if you try.” 

\--

“We lived,” William says when they get back to his place, dry but pleased. 

“We did,” Lizzie said. “Now we just have to do it a few times a year for the foreseeable future.” 

William quirks an eyebrow at her. “A few times a year?” 

Lizzie shrugs, forces herself to keep her voice casual. “Unless you’re planning to break up with me in the next few weeks.” 

Listening to William splutter is kind of amusing, but she takes pity on him once he starts trying to form sentences. Leaning in, she says, “I’m not planning to either, and at least we know they won’t kill each other.” She kisses him, because there’s nowhere good for this conversation to go so distraction is clearly the best choice.

It doesn’t work, because he says, “They might be banding together to kill us instead.” 

“Shut up,” she says, and kisses him for real this time. 

\--

Later, Lizzie pushes William so he’s lying on the sofa, more rumpled than she used to see him before they started dating, and straddles his thighs. His hands are loose on her hips, and he’s smiling. She sweeps her hair over her shoulder and leans down to kiss him. 

This part hasn’t gotten old, though she keeps wondering if it will. The way he smiles against her mouth, the firm touch of his fingers against her skin, the certainty of his movements—and, occasionally, the uncertainty. It’s no longer the heady swirl of touch and skin and emotion that it was at first, but it’s never settled so much as to be boring either. 

They decamp to William’s bedroom, eventually, away from the couch where they sit to watch movies with Gigi and Fitz. It would be too weird—they talked about it a while ago, awkward and a little giggly. 

Besides, the bed is more comfortable anyway.

\--

Her mom brings up marriage in the least subtle ways possible every time she sees William, but those are pretty limited. It makes him tense up and stumble over his words in that same uncomfortable way he did before they got to know each other, and it mostly makes her blush a lot and try to change the subject. It’s hard to convey the nuance of _we’re not talking about getting married yet_ with significant looks and attempts to steer the conversation. Especially the _yet_. The idea of marrying William, well. It’s not so bad. 

Talk about eating crow.

He’s kind of worth it, though. Really worth it, actually. 

\--

Gigi drags Lizzie out for lunch, because she says that Lizzie’s spending too much time holed up in her apartment working, and she needs to enjoy the city. She insists on calling a car, because “I’m not as crazy as you” and “I’m not going to walk all over San Francisco.” 

“No, that’s true, you’re much crazier,” is Lizzie’s response, but Gigi is unphased.

Lunch, of course, is great; Gigi is fantastic company, as usual. She picks Lizzie’s brain about graduate school—for real, this time—and Lizzie asks about the work she’s doing with Pemberley Digital. Things go a little off the rails after that, but all comes back around eventually and—

“William and I owe you a trip to the theater,” Gigi says. 

Which is unexpected, and it’s—it’s such a pointed reminder of everything that led to Lizzie not being able to go to the theater.

“It would be nice to go,” Lizzie says, some sort of politeness instinct taking over and keeping her from gaping at Gigi, or babbling something weird about bad memories. 

“We have an extra ticket in a couple of weeks,” Gigi says, and then smirks. “It won’t be just the two of you this time, I want to see this play.” 

“Oh, does that mean you’re done obviously forcing us to spend time to together?”

Gigi shrugs. “I guess. But it worked, so don’t knock the methods.” 

Lizzie groans. “Oh god, it did. You’re going to do that to everyone, aren’t you?”

“Maybe,” Gigi says, and then cracks up. 

“No wonder you and Lydia get along.” 

\--

It’s weird that Jane and Charlotte aren’t around all the time, and it makes Lizzie want to cling to the moments they get to talk—never enough, but so much better than nothing. She finds herself repeating that old kids’ rhyme in her head, to keep herself from getting too caught up in it all. _Make new friends but keep the old_ , it goes, _some are silver and the others gold_.

Weirdly, it’s helpful—a reminder that relationships are about more than just quantity of time spent together. Other things count too, like the way she thinks of Jane when she hears a song that she would like, and the texts she gets from Charlotte about a horrible TV show she binge watched in an exhausted daze after a long week at work.

And now she has Gigi and William and Fitz, and next week she’s having definitely-not-work drinks with a potential investor, because their meetings kept getting derailed. And no thesis, and no Ricky Collins bursting into her bedroom, and it’s a lot harder for Mom to nag her about getting married when she’s not in the same house. 

\--

The theater is nice, which is exactly what Lizzie expected. William has good taste, and a good grasp of what she likes. And doesn’t like. 

It’s hard to keep from remembering, with a mixture of amusement and horror, that he sat down and watched all her videos, the ones where she insulted him, the ones where she was downright _cruel_ to him. But then, if he saw all that, the cattiness, the resentment, the manipulation, and he’s still here, lacing his fingers through hers in the dark, he’s—she probably doesn’t need to worry about him leaving. 

Not that that’s how it works, she’s figured that much out. It’s not other people leaving her, it’s other people going after things that matter to them. Jane didn’t go to New York to be across the country from Lizzie, she went for a job and a new start. It’s just hard to keep that in perspective sometimes. 

William squeezes her hand. “Don’t zone out on us,” he says in her ear. 

She squeezes it back and lets herself get swept up with the emotion of the play. 

\--

After, all three of them go out for drinks. It’s easy and comfortable, teasing William and chatting about Gigi’s newest plot with Fitz; it feels like family.


End file.
